All Fall Down
by bulletscorpio
Summary: No matter what you do, the blood will always stain. It'll come off your skin and clothes, but the image never leaves your head, and it certainly never left the minds of the tributes of the 68th Games. TW for violence, mental illness and drugs. Spotify playlist:spotify:user:xjay-xx:playlist:6CZuhqIczFPJje6E1Y8irT (song 1 chapter 1 etc. no prologue, playlist starts at chapter 1.)
1. Prologue

I am a teenage disaster. I am a ticking time bomb inconspicuously and expertly hidden, buried inside the head of an average person, just waiting to detonate. I am someone you wouldn't think twice about, yet a catastrophe just waiting to happen. But when the timer runs out, the undiscovered truth will be revealed and the explosion will kill people. When a bomb goes off, those closest to it are killed only by the blast waves, dead by the time the shrapnel reaches them and the buildings fall and the radiation sets in. It's impossible to escape it, but sometimes the damage can be lessened, like getting stitches after a vein has been cut. The scar will always remain, but you're no longer bleeding out. But in my case, no one will know they're bleeding to death until it's happening and the shock has set in and it's too late to reverse. There is nothing I can do and when situations get worse, the clock goes just a little faster, and I get just a little closer to exploding. When the bomb goes off, it will take me with it. Those around me should destroy me before I am the cause of the destruction.

I am unaware of it.


	2. No Plan B

"Hey, you need to wake up. You've been sleeping a long time, you need to get up and get ready. Today's Reaping Day." The body sitting at the foot of my bed says as I let out the moan from when you first wake up, pushing my head deeper than the pillows.

The curtains aren't drawn, yet the light still bleeds through the thin fabric. I'm sure I need to get up and get ready since my parents generally allow me to wake up relatively late, but we have to be to the square by ten or else we can get in legal trouble. The responsible, logical side of me urges me to get up but the ever-present teenage side of me that doesn't have my shit together wins and instead of rising from my bed, all I do is roll over from being facedown to laying on my back and staring at the ceiling for the next five minutes.

The door opens again after I've closed my eyes for a brief second and again I'm being spoken to. "I'm very serious, you're going to be late if you don't get up, and I won't have you executed for 'disrespecting a national holiday' because I'm the only one allowed to do that, considering I'm your mother and even I won't do that because then I won't have any other kids and plus, you're a good kid. So get up. I won't let you die." My mother firmly states.

"Am I gonna die if I have five more minutes?" I groan.

"Yes," she replies. "Get ready, I don't have time for this,"

"I'd rather be killed by the Capitol and likely immortalized forever and inspire a major riot then get out of bed-" My mom takes advantage of my arm dangling off the bed and pulls at my wrist, causing my 170 pound self to nearly fall as she struggles to pull me any further and eventually gives up. I decide to do the rest of the work for her but find myself tangled in the sheets.

Sitting on the edge of my bed, I try to psych myself up to actually do anything instead of crawling back into bed and quite literally getting myself killed. I sigh as I stand up, rubbing the sleep from my eyes. I trudge into my small bathroom and stare at my reflection. Thankfully I don't need a shower, being the night person I am, although I _do_ need a hairbrush as usual. The insistence of my pale blond hair to provide me with atrocious bed hair astounds me. I've forgotten where I put my comb so it's been missing for the past few days although I still rummage through the drawers in search of it and turn up nothing, so I simply take a few minutes to run my hand through my hair to get the knots out of it… again. The pulling sensation helps wake me up a little, and when I brush my teeth the minty flavor does the same.

I walk out of my bathroom to find something acceptable to wear in public and come up with a light blue button down shirt and black pants. I slide on a simple black belt as well, then sighing in annoyance and pushing things around attempting to find the one pair of shoes that would be considered nice, but since I only own two or three pairs of shoes, I put on the only ones I haven't seemingly misplaced. They make my outfit look more casual since they're just black sneakers, but they're quite comfortable and it's not too noticeable especially when I adjust the legs of my pants so the ankles cover the high tops of the shoes.

I reenter my bathroom to do my hair, taking my comb specifically designed to tangle your hair and backcomb the long part, solely relying on the fact that my hair tangles easily to keep it in place, then smoothing it over some so it looks less intentional but without letting anything fall. I've never fully put up my Mohawk, but I prefer it to be somewhat up rather than just lying on my face. The sides are at a good length, a quarter of an inch so I don't need to do anything to them but they don't just blend in with my face. Soon enough, I deem myself ready to go out.

Going down the small flight of stairs, I catch another reflection of myself as I go out the door and smooth out a stray place in my hair until it makes me look, in my opinion, quite fuckable –something I don't often say or think about myself -.

"I'm leaving, guys!" I call, getting a response from my dad in the other room and giving my dog a loving pat on the head as I leave.

I walk out of my small house and meander through the uneven cobblestone streets of the fourth district. I breathe in the salty air of my hometown and feel the wind rush past my ears, carrying the sound of faraway seagulls and waves on the shore.

I spend a few minutes walking alone, which I certainly don't mind, happy with the fact that it's not gotten hot yet considering it's only 930 am or so. I'll likely be home by the time the July heat catches up with the day, although the ocean helps to cool everything down.

I'm not alone for long when I hear a voice coming up behind me. I could recognize it from anywhere.

"Hey," it says breathily, catching up to me.

"Hey," I respond, turning around. "Is everyone else already there?"

"I know Finn's already there since he has to get there early," she replies.

"Victor stuff," I add.

"Yeah, but I'm not sure about Azure and them, I think they went to pick up Cedric since he lives a little farther away and he hates being alone."

"What an extrovert that kid is," I say, shaking my head and smiling at the ground a little. "He can't ever shut up, so he's always got to have people around him to talk to. … Wait, Gee, I think that's them!"

"Where?" Gee asks. "Oh, I see them." We start going to catch up to them, and within a minute we're talking to the rest of our friends minus Finnick, but he's already at the reaping and then he has to leave with the tributes for mentoring. I'll admit, I'm going to miss him considering he's my best friend and we've known each other since we were seven.

"Where's Toto? She didn't come with you guys?" I ask, noticing her absence.

"Oh, she dipped out back to her house 'cause she forgot something, but she said she'll meet back up with us somewhere along the way." Azure replies.

"Thy hair looks nice," Gee turns to me.

"Thanks," I say. I get a fair amount of compliments on various things based on my looks, but I never really expect them too much since I don't find myself attractive. Although I don't often believe them, being told nice things is cool. "Took me a bit to put it up and I couldn't find my other shoes, so I had to wear these-" I point my foot out, standing on one leg then returning to walking as normal. "so I look like a mess, but I doubt anyone will really notice."

"You _are_ a mess!" Azure laughs. _It's true_ , I think. I respond with exactly that.

Suddenly someone jumps onto my back as their pale hands cover my eyes and I hear in a lighthearted tone, which gives away identity, "Hey, child!"

"Why're you calling me child? I'm _twice your size_!"

"You're not twice my size!" Toto exclaims, her bright red hair flying everywhere as she hops down off my back. "Look, I'm to your shoulder," she says while measuring from the top of her head.

"That's my _chest_. You need new glasses." I joke.

"If anything I need a new eye, not better glasses." Toto responds. "Or I guess just go plural and then I can have a full set of new eyes. That and monetary compensation for every moment of my life since age five where I held a disadvantage because I couldn't see properly, before my other eye started getting worse and I didn't need glasses. And I may need to shoot a Peacekeeper or two and blow up the Capitol for ruining my vision." Her expression gets darker as she goes on.

"Toto, that was super loud, you're going to get shot if a Peacekeeper hears that, and you've already taken enough physical damage from them," Cedric warns.

"It's okay, Cedric, I've been like this since childhood and they probably know that I hope they all have the exact same thing happen to them. Plus, there's nothing they could charge me with so I can't get in trouble for saying that." She responds.

"Death/injury threats against a government official," I supply. "And you'd get one count for every Peacekeeper in Panem. And you just said you wanted to blow up the Capitol, too."

"Well, maybe they should get charged with causing a five year old severe bodily harm."

"Look, Toto, we know it sucks that that happened to you and that had it not happened you would probably be only around a quarter blind instead of about three quarters, and losing an eye for no good reason seems like it's pretty life-ruining, although I wouldn't know since I'm not you, but we're just trying to look out for you since your comment _was_ really loud and there's always Peacekeepers everywhere on Reaping Day and we just don't want you to get whipped or tortured or murdered by the Capitol for inciting some kind of conspiracy against literally the entire government, since you _did_ say you wanted to shoot some Peacekeepers and blow up the Capitol, so you definitely could get charged with high treason or whatever. All I'm saying is that we're telling you this for your own safety's sake. "Azure pipes up after not talking for a while.

"Okay," Toto says defeatedly, looking down. Her voice drops nearly an octave but remains soft. While it changes wildly, I've never heard her voice become rough or hard, and this doesn't even change when on the off chance she mentions anything regarding easily the worst experience of her life. It gets lower in pitch, but in the time I've known her, I've never seen her outwardly show any negative emotion beyond bitterness. It amazes me.

She looks for something to clean her glasses with but finds nothing since she's wearing a dress, so I untuck the tail of my shirt and offer it to her, which she gratefully uses, adding that she could barely see before. I'm tucking the tail back in just seconds before we arrive at the Reaping Day check in line at the square.

The five of us stand waiting in the line, which is relatively long, and out of boredom our conversation fizzles away to nothing. We absentmindedly stand in silence and shuffle along as people get checked in, the line beginning to move faster. Eventually we're at the front and since she's closest to the table, Azure goes first, wincing as the needle draws a little blood from her finger and she's allowed to proceed. Gee goes next, and I know she hates it but she's learned not to react to the sensation. Still, her hand involuntarily twitches right before the needle pierces her skin. The woman working the sign in table grips her wrist tighter out of annoyance. Then the small machine displays in green digital letters, 'GENEVIEVE NERO … ELIGIBLE FOR REAPING'. Gee leaves and Toto is next, pushing up her glasses with one hand while holding out the other, done as well.

I take a couple steps forward and meet the table. The attendant, who has to look up to make eye contact with me, prepares another needle with incredible speed. I offer my hand and she takes it by the wrist with one hand and does the blood drawing with the other. Within seconds the machine reads my DNA profile and signs me in, so I leave and rejoin the rest of my friends while Cedric gets checked in. He meets back up with us and we quickly walk to our section, looking for the little signs that designate the age group in each roped off section. I take Gee's hand as we comb the crowd, looking for the sign.

"There it is," Cedric finds it first, pointing to the small gray sign reading 'AGE 17' so we go through the opening in the rope. We settle ourselves in and eventually due the way people move for us, we end up near the center of the group of seventeen year olds. For the same reason, Gee's and my contact gets broken as our fingers slip away, feeling only the ghost of each other's hands. I end up between Azure and Cedric.

"Who do you think's gonna go this year?" he asks, because he's just Cedric being Cedric and literally cannot shut up. At least it's an interesting topic to pass the five minutes before the actual Reaping starts.

"I don't know, maybe Kai?" Toto guesses.

"Kai Albacore or Kai Medrano?"

"Medrano, definitely. I mean, I guess Girl Kai could too, but she's less willing to put herself out there so I doubt she'd volunteer, and it's probably pretty unlikely that she'd get reaped."

Gee adds, "What about the mayor's kid? Whatever the fuck his name is."

"I think he's nineteen now, but I could be wrong. I reckon there'll at least one eighteen year old dying to take their very last chance at going into the Games, though. Maybe even two." I contribute.

"Watch it be someone completely unexpected, like some twelve year old or something. I'd laugh." Azure says, finishing her sentence just as the ceremony starts.

Our escort, Julia Archer, sashays onto the stage, her spiky heels clicking on the metal stage with every step she takes. Her entire outfit this year is neon green and the color is an assault to my eyes. She shifts her beehive –that I suspect is a wig- with ornamental birds coming out of it and excitedly hands the microphone to the mayor, who begins his long, boring speech.

"Long ago, our prosperous nation rebelled against its good-natured government. Brother turned on brother and war forever changed Panem. To stop the uprising, the thirteenth district, graphite, was … eliminated. In the Capitol's effort to forgive the districts, every remaining district signed a treaty, stating that henceforth and forevermore, each district shall offer up one male and female tribute to participate in a televised battle of courage, strength, determination, and sacrifice until a lone victor stands for the purpose of entertainment- a fight to the death, a pageant that will be named the Hunger Games." He clears his throat before reciting in unison with Julia, "Panem today, Panem tomorrow, Panem forever."

Julia is misty eyed. She places a manicured hand over her heart, misty eyed from listening to a speech recited yearly and prewritten by the Capitol and mandatory for the mayor of every district to read in order to try and guilt trip the districts into regretting ever being disloyal. Literally misty eyed at a generic speech we've all heard a million times. I find it ridiculous. It's not even a good speech.

She excitedly sighs with a smile on her face and delicately claps. She decides to do the thing that escorts do, tapping the microphone, even though it clearly works because she just talked into it like two seconds ago. "What a beautiful speech!" I roll my eyes. "Happy Reaping Day, my favorite time of year! What a wonderful day! Let's get started, shall we?"

The anticipation in the air is tangible as the entirety of District Four waits with bated breath. A couple people shift around a bit, getting ready to run and volunteer.

"Now, ladies first!" Julia beams. She reaches into the glass bowl, clawing around with her terrifyingly long nails and causing nearly everyone to wince from the sound. She finally draws out a slip, carefully opens it, and speaks.

"Genevieve Nero!" she chirps. My heart stops for a second and once I've processed that the name on the slip is that of the girl with the wavy hair standing just diagonal of me, and that it is her and only her, that there is only one Genevieve Nero and it is the one I know and love, and it's _my_ Genevieve Nero that's about to walk on that stage, the shock sets in and I fully understand what's just happened. My thoughts race around inside my head just after short circuiting and then our group of friends is cheering and we're all doing a group high five together as Gee smirks, the crowd parting for her. No one is going to volunteer. Even people who have never met her can tell that doing that would get them beaten to a bloody, weeping pulp and Gee would have no reservations about just stomping on their neck and ending it there.

Her dark reddish brown hair swishes as she steps purposefully up the stairs and adjusts her black vest a little bit. When she arrives onstage, she tries to contain her smile, but little bits of it seep through if you're looking for them. Julia's poofy, bow-ridden dress nearly brushes against Gee's black-clad leg despite the fact that they're multiple feet away from each other.

"What an honor it is for you to be a tribute in our wonderful Hunger Games, Genevieve! And what a lovely name!"

Gee looks a little uncomfortable, looking down at the ground and muttering a quiet 'thank you', clearly embarrassed by receiving a compliment- let alone from someone dressed in neon green.

"And now, for the boys." Julia presses her lips together and puts her hands in the other bowl.

Within fractions of a second, I'm screaming, screaming at the top of my lungs like no one will hear me, like my life depends on it and I'm going to die a horrific death if I don't, but for the sake of everything I hold dear I'm screaming that I volunteer, I volunteer as tribute…

The jaws of everyone around me drop collectively and out of shock they part again, this time for me. I begin walking through the divide, but Azure, Toto and Cedric try to grab my wrist to stop me, but I pull away fast enough.

"Don't do it," Toto whispers.

"Jesus Christ, you're out of your god damn mind right now, think about what you're doing, you're writing one of your death sentences!" Cedric yells.

"There's nothing we can do, guys," Azure says softly, giving up.

I make my way up the stairs and as I do, Finnick, who somehow hasn't launched out of his chair and decked me in the face then hugged me whilst crying and yelling at me, and instead miraculously has remained seated with the other victors, mouths, ' _what the fuck?_ ' to me with an appalled look on his face.

Even if I wanted to, there's no turning back now. I've arrived onstage looking into the face of my girlfriend, who looks like there's a bomb about to detonate right in front of her but still stands motionless and unyielding at 5'10", clearly confused and furious but unable to do anything.

Julia meets me in the middle of where we both are and holds the microphone so I can talk into it and excitedly asks, "And what would your name be?"

I have to lean in a little because even in heels she's having a fair amount of trouble holding the microphone up to where it needs to be in order to cope with my height.

"I'm Alexander Marina, but you can call me whatever you want." My voice comes out much more calmly and confidently than I expected it to.

"Well, Alexander, what a brave young man you are!" she beams. "Ladies and gentlemen, District Four's tributes of the sixty-eighth annual Hunger Games!" She grins at the crowd, who is speechless. Then she steps back a couple feet to give us room to walk to each other.

I turn to face Genevieve Nero as we shake hands and for the first time today, we stare into each other's identical sea green eyes.

I will never again feel the little dips in the streets from the saltwater cracking the cobblestone. I will never see the clouds on the beach again. I know I'm not coming home, but that doesn't mean Four won't have a victor.


	3. Break

I stare into the crowd of disappointed faces, eighteen year olds that will never have the chance to become tributes themselves.

"Happy Hunger Games, and may the odds be ever in your favor!" Julia presses her thumb into her gemstone ring, and before I really understand what's happening, an infinite-seeming arsenal of glitter rains down on us and I realize that the ring is what set it off. Gee and I, both seemingly thinking the same thing, sigh dejectedly knowing there's nothing we can do. The prospect of being stuck for a week with this woman who shoots glitter out of her overelaborately decorated hair and wears dresses that have a reach of multiple feet does not make me happy and to be honest, I'm not sure if I'll be able to handle it.

A Peacekeeper stands directly behind each of us, ushering us into separate rooms of the Justice Building for our allotted hour when people can go say goodbye to tributes before they're herded onto the train to the Capitol.

Once I'm left alone, I sit on the arm of the red velvet couch and stare out the window, trying to take in as much of my home while I can, before we're off and to the Capitol for the rest of our short lives.

Through the heavy wooden door I overhear a few pissed-off sounding kids, likely overly eager Career kids, ranting at the reaping results and how now they won't ever get to be in the Games, saying things like how they wish Julia had picked someone else, someone people wouldn't be scared to volunteer for and on and on.

"Those stupid fucking seventeen year olds! They just _couldn't_ have waited until they were eighteen and given _us_ a chance! They just _had_ to go now, didn't they?"

"And Julia couldn't have gotten even the next slip over, probably someone people wouldn't be afraid of volunteering for, but instead that fucking Capitol bitch reaped whatever her name is … she reaped whoever Genevieve Nero's ass is and no one was brave enough to volunteer for that little bitch! Now we're never gonna go to the Games!"

"Yeah, and all for nothing! She's probably just some weak ass kid that thinks she's so important and entitled, but everyone's scared of her for nothing! We just lost our chance to some little seventeen year old who's just gonna die in the arena anyway! We could actually win unlike her! She just fucking intimidated her way onto that stage and probably through her whole short meaningless little life because she thinks she's better than anybody else-"

"Guys, we're right by the Justice Building, they can probably hear us!"

"Yeah, I hope those little fuckers do! They deserve to hear the truth! I hope they hear that they're gonna die and literally no one will even miss them! I bet their parents will be glad that they don't have to deal with their selfish asses anymore and they can finally bury their precious little Alexander Marina and Genevieve Nero and forget about them like the rest of Four! I mean, maybe some people'll pretend to be sad but they're just some weak motherfuckers that think they can win! They just think they're entitled to have a spot in the Games because they're better than everyone else! Well, I hope they hear that they aren't shit! I bet they'll even die in the bloodbath!"

"No, but you guys, I've literally seen her deck someone and break his nose in one hit! She actually could kick someone's face in and kill them, they're both pretty scary though! They could both win, have you seen them with spears and tridents? And remember the school project where we had to showcase a skill we had that would help us in the Games? I was a TA in their class that year so I saw the presentations, she beat the teacher at sword fighting and he hit every target perfectly with his trident!"

The door swings open, colliding with the wall so hard I half expect it to fall off its hinges, and my parents come in, slamming it behind them. My dad is clearly calmer and he talks less to give my mom time to say what she wants. She doesn't seem to need it though, yelling over anything I try to say. I stand up off the arm of the couch.

"Are you fucking _kidding_ me, Alex? What the _fuck_ is wrong with you?" my mother yells. "Maybe I _should_ execute you!" Suddenly my face stings, and I stumble back in shock. Realizing she's just slapped me, I want to yell back at her and almost do, but stop myself just before I open my mouth.

"Mom, I-"she cuts me off, her hand colliding with my face again and continuing to do so two, three, four more times. Five more.

"I don't care about your explanation! The damage is done and no matter what you say that's not going to be reversed! I don't want to hear your bullshit excuses right now!" she screams at me, grabbing a vase off the table and getting ready to throw it. Luckily my dad pries it out of her hands before she actually does, so my ducking is in vain.

"It all happened so fast and I didn't even realize what I was doing, i-it's like if you're about to drown and you can't really think properly and you just do the first thing that comes to your mind-"I start to say, the words tumbling from my mouth.

"Shut the fuck up, Alex! I don't care about your side of this, and did you ever think about how anyone _else_ would feel about it? No, you _didn't_ , because you never do, and you only think about yourself-"

"Ariella, that's a bit of an exaggeration-"my dad steps in, putting his hand on my mom's shoulder, but she cuts him off.

She pushes his hand away, her nails digging into her palms. "No, it's not, Marlin, and you know it! You know he's impulsive, but he's never fucked up this much and now it's going to cost either him and or Gee their lives because he couldn't have just shut the fuck up for once!" It's now that I notice that while she stands defiant and strong, a downpour of tears rushes down her face, some of her eye makeup going with it.

"I'm sorry, Mom, it was just the first thing that went through my head and it was all I could think to do, there was no other option, I'm sorry," I say softly. "Yes, I agree it was stupid as fuck, but it was all I could do and sometimes it's the best and only chance you _have_. But there's no going back now, and it's what I had to do."

My mother's tone softens as well. She calms down and leans into my dad as she cries. "I know. I don't know what I expected you to do in that kind of situation."

"He's always been just like you, Ari," my dad adds.

"I know. I just don't want him to get hurt." Her shoulders still shake as she wipes her eyes with the sleeve of her sweater.

"I can handle myself, I know it. I'll be okay. It's just that I couldn't have stood and run the risk of something happening and having to just powerlessly watch. It's not that I don't have faith in her, it's just that if I can physically be there there's more I can do."

"I know it's because you care about her, and I think Gee's lucky to be close to someone like you, someone who's willing to do anything to protect people they care about."

"I don't know if you have anything on you, so I got your shark tooth necklace from home." My dad says, pulling it out of his pocket and tying it around my neck, careful not to get any of my hair in the knot.

"Thanks, Dad." I say.

"I'm sorry I said all that, Alex. It was just the heat of the moment and I promise you if I meant any of it, you would have no doubt I did. Nothing's wrong with you, and I _do_ care about what you have to say, and you're not impulsive, and you've never truly fucked up, I hope you know that, and I hope you know that we'll always love you no matter what. And I'm sorry I hit you. I didn't mean any of that. I love you." My mom pulls my face in by hers, which seems difficult since I'm 6'2" and she's about 5'5". "Marlin, I think we need to go. His friends are going to want to see him."

The three of us get up off the couch to say our final goodbyes and both of my parents start getting a little teary.

"Take care of Caspian for me, okay? Make sure to play with him and all." I advise, already missing him. I'm not going to get to pet him ever, or give him the customary loving scratch on his dark brown ruff from when I get home every day. "I love you guys, too."

"Of course," they respond.

"Bye, Alex," they say, about to leave.

"Bye, guys,"

Once they walk out the door, but before it closes, I hear my dad say to my mom, "It'll be okay, Ariella. He'll be okay." I realize that's the last time I'll ever see my family again, or hear their voices. But I simply swallow the lump in my throat and ignore the associated emotions, knowing I'll have to present myself again soon.

A couple minutes later, Toto, Azure and Cedric come in.

"Have you talked to Gee?" I ask. I don't know what I want to hear.

"For a little bit. Then her aunt wanted to talk to her, so we left." Azure says. "So we came to hang out with you."

"You guys aren't going to try and knock the shit out of me or anything?" I say cautiously.

"Looks like that already happened," Toto chimes in. "Seriously, your cheek is a lot redder than the other. You get hit?"

"Was just my mom. It's okay though, it's not she does it a lot or goes any farther or anything, in fact that's the first time in my life either of my parents have ever done anything to me physically. Plus, she apologized, although I didn't ask for it. And I know where she's coming from, it's okay," I respond, touching a hand to my face.

"Okay," Cedric says jokingly. "Then I guess we don't have to."

"There's not much you guys could do, anyway. I'm a lot taller than you guys."

"Kick you in the back of the knee. Then you'd fall and you'd be defenseless. But we won't do that, regardless of our thoughts on your decisions." says Toto.

"Great. I feel better now." I respond in a deadpan voice. "Now I know how much you guys love me and are definitely _not_ willing to attempt to beat me into a coma over my decision-making."

"You shouldn't have done that." Cedric asserts.

"What _else_ was I going to do?" I ask defensively. "You guys know how I am."

"Yeah, Alex, you're protective as fuck and sometimes that's good, but you've got to think about the consequences of things before you do stuff." Azure steps in.

"You guys sound exactly like my parents,"

"Good, then they're smart," she continues. "But only one of you guys can win. You both won't come back alive, maybe not even one. You guys would have to get past twenty two other people, some of them Careers like us, and if you guys managed to do that, even so, still one of you would have to die-"

"Azure!" chides Toto. "Don't say they're gonna die, Jesus Christ!"

"What? I'm being realistic."

"We can handle ourselves. It'll be okay." I say. "I know I'm protective and even if Gee and I had no skill whatsoever, we'd have that. I'm quite literally willing to risk my life for people, I don't mind dying if the person is important enough."

Cedric and Azure laugh a little at my _'I don't mind dying'_ comment, brushing it off as a desperate attempt at comic relief. But I really don't mind, while my sense of physical self-preservation keeps me going, I know that at my death there wouldn't be much to miss, and there'd be a little more air for everyone else. The tides would keep changing and time would go on without me. The world carries on after people die, so why would I be any different? I'm just one person in an entire universe, dying won't fundamentally change anything. But most people don't seem to realize that.

At least by blowing it off people will think nothing of the subtle hint instead of trying to get in the way of my delicate plans. But at the same time, I just wish someone would believe me when I say things. I wish someone would think something of my words instead of taking them for granted and expecting me to always be there speaking them but with no one will to actually listen to them. I wish someone would take note of and remember what I say sometimes. I wish someone would listen to me when I speak and think something of it instead of just hearing my words and forgetting them. I wish someone would understand me. Not everything is a joke and not everything that I say is meaningless. But for now, not being taken seriously will be okay for the time being, while my thoughts need to be kept tightly under wraps.

"We're gonna want to go if we want to finish talking to Gee," says Azure.

Toto turns to me quietly. "I need to talk to you for a second."

"Oh, Toto, I hope it's not to tell him you're madly in love with him or anything, because if you were to cheat on me that'd be unfortunate." Cedric says, twisting his lip ring.

"Yes, Cedric, I'm cheating on you with someone who also has a girlfriend," she replies sarcastically.

They turn to say goodbye to me. Surprisingly enough, we find ourselves embracing in a hug, something we seldom do.

"Well, I guess this is goodbye," I say.

"Yeah … bye," they respond, turning to leave. The door closes quietly behind them.

I turn to Toto as the room gets quieter. She looks back to me, turning away from the door. She looks up to meet my eyes and takes a step back.

"Look, Alex, it might not be obvious to other people, but I know what you're doing." Her voice gets lower.

"What?"

"Don't act like you don't know what I'm talking about. You might have decided quickly, but I can tell what you're planning to do. Notice how I didn't laugh just a bit ago? It's 'cause I knew you weren't joking."

"Yeah, but that doesn't mean I have some secret ulterior motive or anything-"

"It might not always, but in this case, it does. Like I said, I know what you're doing."

"And what do you think that is?" I ask, fearing she'll be accurate.

Toto sighs. "You're going to try and use the fact that you guys are both capable of winning and the fact that you're Careers to get you guys to the final two…" she trails off for a second. The more she speaks, her voice becomes more and more melancholy. "… and then you're gonna somehow kill yourself so she wins."

Fuck.

Spot on. I look down to avoid her knowing gaze and exhale defeatedly.

"How'd you know?"

"Because, Alex, it's easy to see how much you care about her and I know you, and you're so fiercely protective over people when you care about them, and I just _know_ ,"

"Okay," I say softly, as if someone might hear us. "Whatever you do, keep that to yourself. I don't think the Capitol would be happy with that and I think they'd just send an avalanche after me, like, right after the bloodbath, like with the guy last year, and then I wouldn't be able to do anything 'cause I would've died too soon."

"You mean the one who resorted to cannibalism, whatever his name was? Titus or something stupid like that?"

"Yeah,"

"Don't worry, Alexander Marina, your secret's safe with me. You know I'd do anything to fuck up the Capitol." Toto smiles. "I'll miss you."

"Mr. Marina, your hour is up." a Peacekeeper opens the door.

"Bye, Alex. Good luck." Toto looks up at me, her back to the Peacekeeper, and smirks.

"Bye, Toto."

The Peacekeeper leads her out the door and before he closes it, she looks back and I catch a fragment of a wistful smile on her face.


	4. Die For You

The Peacekeeper ushers me out of the room and I ask him, "Do I still have glitter on me?" He quickly scans over my hair and shirt with his eyes and tells me no. "Okay, thanks," I reply.

He leads me to a long black car with tinted windows and opens the back compartment, which to my surprise has two long couches facing each other and is surprisingly fancy. A different Peacekeeper leads Gee in as well, and then they close the doors. Gee and I sit next to each other, and also in the back sitting area with us is Julia, along with all the victors from Four.

I stare out the window for the next few minutes, perplexed at the experience since I've never been in a car before. Soon we're at the train station after a surprisingly short ride.

The train station is packed with reporters and their insectlike cameras trained directly on us. There's one right in front of my face and I have to physically resist the temptation to bat it away in annoyance. I can feel a microphone's presence directly over my head, almost touching my hair, and I can barely hold back the irritation in my face in order to keep myself calm. Glancing up at the screens broadcasting us live, I notice that my expression doesn't deviate much from the usual. I'm not sure why anyone would want to watch a couple teenagers being herded onto a train whist assaulted by reporters and all of their equipment, but I guess it's for the Capitol's benefit.

Suddenly a reporter shoves a microphone into my face and squeaks, "Congratulations, Alexander! What an honor it must be for you to be a District Four representative in this year's Hunger Games!"

"Thanks, it really is-" I start saying, but get cut off by Julia snatching my arm and pulling me, scratching me with her harrowingly long nails in the process. We have to stand in the doorway for a few minutes while more pictures are taken, when finally we're allowed to take a step back and be inside the train. The automatic doors slide shut. We start moving immediately and the initial speed is astounding. This isn't a conventional seafood-over-ice train. This is one of the high-speed Capitol models manufactured in District Six that probably averages 250 miles per hour or something like that. Even the concept that that kind of land exists amazes me, considering up until now, I've never left District Four since inter-district travel is forbidden with the exception of officially sanctioned duties. I stare out the window as long as I can, until my home becomes just a pinprick and then completely disappears, and I fully realize that I am truly never going to see it ever again.

With my palm on the window as I lean on it, the cold glass coerces me to stay, holding onto the concept of home, something that's gone now, and gone forever. Maybe it's the temperature of the glass window, the closest feeling to the cold seawater, but I linger as long as possible. Through the reflections I can see behind me, noticing that Gee has the exact same idea. The train stays comfortably silent for a little while, allowing me to lean on the cold window, holding on to the closest feeling that I can get to anything I'm familiar with, and I stay for as long as possible, lingering and not wanting to let go, like breaking an embrace with someone to say goodbye, but you know it's the last goodbye and you want to take every moment you can until you're forced to break contact and part ways, but then all you feel is the ghost of the comforting embrace.

Julia breaks it.

"Everyone, we have to give our tributes the tour of the train! We can't have them getting lost!" she chirps, then giggling at her own comment about getting lost. I roll my eyes.

I peel myself off the window and walk to the middle of the room where Julia and the victors are, Gee following after.

For the first time, I start to notice how incredibly fancy everything is. From the dining table to the couches to the wallpaper, everything on this train screams Capitol. Eventually we start getting a tour of the whole train, but I only pay attention to things like where each person's room is and how to use the shower. Only the important things.

An hour later, we've been given the full tour of the entire train and we're back in the dining car. Julia also insists that we're introduced to 'all the lovely victors, who will be helping you to win this year'.

We already know of them all, but we don't tell Julia that for fear of crushing her spirit. Mags goes first because she's the oldest, in her early seventies, then a black-haired woman maybe my parents' age named Lorraine, then a dark skinned guy in his twenties named Wave, and then Finnick just tells Julia that the three of us already know each other.

"Lovely! Then, if we're done with introductions, we can get to watching the recaps of the reapings!" The television flickers to life so we can see who our meager competition is.

The Capitol seal shows for a bit with the national anthem playing in the background, which is the customary intro and outro for anything Hunger Games related. Then the actual footage starts, and District One's escort shoves his face into the camera and exclaims animatedly, " _Hellooo_ , Panem! It's time to see who will be representing District One!" I can tell by these first few seconds, in which he hasn't even walked onstage, that I will not enjoy watching his reaping, and I hope I never have the misfortune of ever meeting this man.

He adjusts his top hat and strokes a gloved finger over his ridiculously curled pale pink handlebar mustache before marching up the steps. He greets the district and gives the mayor the microphone, and the mayor reads the Treaty of Treason in a voice so monotone I start to wonder if he's even human.

Once the escort goes over to the girls' bowl I start paying attention, considering these are going to be some of our allies. He pulls a slip out and starts to open it –a lot faster than Julia- but a girl around our age pushes through the crowd to volunteer. She mounts the stage and says in the microphone, "My name is Belladonna Ruby and I will be this year's victor!" She has the classic District One appearance, with her long blond curls and emerald green eyes.

Another kid's name is drawn, but a fourteen year old named Satin volunteers in the guy's place. He looks like his female counterpart, except he has light brown ringlets instead, and she has maybe an inch on him.

District Two I'm interested to see as well. Their escort reaps an eighteen year old girl with lank red hair by the name of Atropa Vespa, but then a shaggy-haired fourteen year old whose name is Cascade volunteers, causing the former to scream a long string of swear words at her. The escort moves on from the girls.

"My name's Sage van Ausdal," says the guy who ends up volunteering, baring his teeth a little. He's our age, and has slanted brown eyes and tousled black hair. When they shake hands he looks at Cascade almost condescendingly, with one eyebrow raised.

In Three, both are reaped. They're both pale skinned and have thick frizzy curls. The girl sighs while onstage, presumably to calm herself down, and smooths down a lock of platinum blond hair. She's dressed in a turquoise silk button down blouse and a tailored gray pencil skirt. The guy, Volt something, casually avoids eye contact with the crowd.

The camera goes to our district so I try and figure out how to fast forward, but Julia tells me that the remote senses what you're watching and if it's mandatory viewing, like anything Hunger Games related, then the only that works is the subtitles and the volume up button.

"Why not down?" asks Gee. "Oh, is it so that you can't have it so quiet that you can't hear it?" she adds sarcastically.

Julia greets the crowd in her ostentatious outfit and ridiculously soprano Capitol accent and then lets the mayor read the Treaty of Treason and surprisingly enough, you can't tell that she gets emotional over it at that point.

She excitedly goes over to the reaping bowl, her heels clicking the whole way. "Genevieve Nero!" she calls. The camera focuses on us, as Gee smiles and our friends cheer and high five her. She walks up the stairs confidently.

"And now, for the boys." Julia reaches her hand in the bowl, but doesn't have a chance to pull one out since in split seconds, my voice breaks through the crowd.

"I volunteer!" I yell. The camera zooms in on us again, the look of shock registering on everyone's faces. The crowd parts and I start walking through, surprisingly calm-looking, but Toto, Cedric and Azure try to stop me.

Toto whispers, "Don't do it,"

Cedric yells after me. "Jesus Christ, you're out of your god damn mind right now, think about what you're doing, you're writing one of your death sentences!"

"There's nothing we can do, guys." Azure says.

I walk up the stairs as the expressions of Finnick and Gee start matching those of the crowd. Julia strolls over to me and asks, "And what would your name be?"

"I'm Alexander Marina, but you can call me whatever you want," I respond.

"Well, Alexander, what a brave young man you are! Ladies and gentlemen, District Four's tributes of the sixty-eighth annual Hunger Games!" Julia smiles and steps back as Gee and I shake hands, and thankfully they don't show us getting glitter shot in our faces. Finally the footage changes to District Five.

An intelligent-looking girl with hair just past her jawline is reaped, her cold, calculating steel blue eyes accusingly scanning everyone in the crowd as she strides up the steps showing no emotion, almost as if somehow they've put her on the stage. Once he's reaped, her district partner –a tall, thin kid who's deathly pale to the point where it doesn't seem too implausible for him to be bleeding out somewhere- steps up timidly, and smiles shyly not because he's elated but because he's crestfallen and a lot of people are staring at him.

In Six, a girl wearing red lipstick gets picked and she walks out of her age group in more of an 'aw shucks, that's some bad luck' way than an 'oh shit I'm gonna die' way. The only thing I remember about her district partner is that he has light green eyes.

District Seven brings us a thirteen year old girl with brown hair and dark green eyes that are fearstruck despite her trying in vain to hide it. Her district partner has shaggy brown hair and warm brown eyes and a girl in the crowd starts crying into her friend's shoulder.

The girl from Eight seems emotionless, stepping up with no reaction. She's got paper-white skin, sleek black hair that looks almost like an iridescent blue or green, and intense blue eyes. The guy, like her, has pretty good bone structure and the same black hair, but I can tell they're clearly not related, probably not even knowing each other.

From Nine comes a pissed-off looking girl with shimmering dirty blond hair that's unusually shiny considering her curls. The guy actually has a fair amount of muscle, which surprises me a little. He looks slightly sunburned and winces a little because of it when he and his district partner shake hands.

Ten gives us a girl who looks maybe fifteen and has her chocolate brown hair in double braids, and it's clear her femininity will be the end of her as she stares into a boy's eyes with a ' _save me_ ' look on her face, clearly holding back tears. A guy with hair that falls in waves across his forehead gets picked. His eyes scan through the crowd for a moment before landing back on his district partner to shake hands with her, giving her a look of pity as he does so.

From District Eleven, a dark-skinned thirteen year old is reaped and once she walks into the aisle a little kid, maybe six or so, calls, "Flora!". She tucks her hair behind her ear and tries to wipe away some of the tears that spill over, until they just get faster and faster, flowing down her face like a silent, steady river and she just stops trying. Two other girls in her age group end up weeping as well when she solemnly mounts the stage as if she's writing a death sentence. Her district partner is maybe her age or perhaps a year older. He's also dark-skinned, but relatively tall unlike her. He doesn't react much to being reaped.

Lastly, from Twelve comes a petite and elven blond girl about twelve years old. She's maybe 4'8" and wears a blue dress too short for her that she keeps subtly tugging at from the bottom. She awkwardly shuffles up the stairs with her amber eyes averted. Next a dude wearing thick eyeliner and homemade fingerless gloves also too small- probably an older sibling's- flicks his gray eyes. He does a casual head toss, temporarily moving his hair out of his eyes as he starts to walk onstage, his fingers slipping out of a girl's. Once he and his female counterpart shake hands she starts crying. Surprisingly, he hugs her a little and whispers a quiet ' _I know_ ' to her. I notice the major skin difference between the two, the former having olive skin and the latter being nearly chalk white.

"Happy Hunger Games, and may the odds be _ever_ in your favor!" the escort grins.

Wave turns off the television and asks, "So, what are your thoughts?"

"Honestly no one really seems like much of a threat except the other Careers, I guess, but we're gonna be allies so that won't be too much of a problem. I mean, even if we weren't, we're pretty capable too so it wouldn't matter much." I reply.

"Yeah, that pretty much sums up my thoughts too." Gee adds.

"Well, if you want to bring in allies from outlying districts that's not uncommon, but if you want to keep it to just you two and the pairs from One and Two, that's also pretty common. Neither one is too out of the ordinary." says Wave.

I say, "We'll figure it out with the rest of the alliance, I guess. See what they want to do."

"Oh, yeah, when do we meet them?" asks Gee.

Julia, who I had temporarily almost forgotten about the existence of because she was being so quiet, pitches in by telling us roughly how the coming week is going to go. "Tomorrow when we get to the Capitol, you'll meet your stylists and prep teams and then after they're done working on you, the Tribute Parade will be held, and usually tributes meet each other before the Parade starts. Then the day after that, you'll start training and that will last for three days. On the third day, you'll have half a day to train and then the Gamemakers will see you for your private sessions, and then they'll publicly release the scores that night. Starting the next morning, the victors and I will prepare you for the interviews that night. And then the next morning we have to wake up bright and early because the Games start at ten o clock sharp!"

Wave stands up. "Hey, if you two want to go hang out wherever you can, we have some mentor-y things to do before dinner gets ready and we can come find you once it's ready, okay?"

"Sure," Gee and I say, turning to leave. We both start walking down the hall looking for our names on the doors, since I guess we both weren't paying attention during the tour. I eventually find my name carved on a gold plaque drilled to a door, so I turn the fancy knob and start to go in.

"Alex," I hear, and twitch a little in alarm, then turn around. "Fuck, you startled me," I say, quietly sighing in relief.

"Sorry," Gee responds, standing right across from me and leaning on her door. "But this isn't going to be a conversation we should have out here."

"Your room or mine?"

"We're technically closest to mine by a couple inches, so I guess mine." I close my door and follow Gee into her room. She shuts her door as silently as possible and turns on the lights. Her emotionless expression and carefully controlled tone melt away, her eyes turning cold and flinty.

"What the _fuck_ , Alex? Did you really think I wouldn't be able to handle myself? I can do _fine_ in that arena, _with or without you_!" her voice begins to raise.

"It all happened so fast that there was no time to think, and what if you were to die? If I hadn't volunteered I wouldn't be able to live with the fact that had I been there you might've lived, and I could've saved you! Look, Gee, it's for the best, we know each other better and we're not going to betray each other in the arena, right? Things are better off this way than if someone else random had gone instead of me, and I reckon they wouldn't care much about you ending up okay since they'd be focused on just winning!"

"Oh, I can tell you _really_ think I'm capable of doing anything on my own, don't you?" Gee hisses.

"Gee, I-"

"That's exactly what you think, and I'm gonna prove to you that I do _not_ need you to help me with anything, and if you think I can't do anything on my own, then fuck you, Alex." The storm in her eyes rages on, her chin high as she leans her arms on the bedside table confrontationally. "And in fact, I'm entirely sure I can do it infinitely better than you."

"Go ahead, do that, but know that it's not ' _I think you're weak_ ' logic, it's ' _better safe than sorry_ ' logic."

"Well, if it means I wouldn't have to be on the same plane of existence as you, I'd rather be sorry, Alexander Marina."

That stings. I'm sure she knows it, but I would never tell her.

The edge in my laughter is tangible. "Great. Thanks." I respond curtly. "Great to know you don't appreciate a single effort I made for you, but it'd be better if I'd known that beforehand so I wouldn't have wasted my time volunteering for your ass. Y'know, maybe I _should_ let you die. At this point I might just kill you myself and be done with it. Perhaps you'll live to see the morning if you lock your door tonight, Genevieve Nero."

"And same to you."

I leave the room wordlessly, making sure to leave the door just slightly open because Gee hates when people do it, and right on cue, I hear her characteristic growl of annoyance and I know she knows it was deliberate.

Closing my own door, I turn on the shower and roughly grab one of the plush white towels and hang it on the bar. Not bothering to be neat, I simply throw my clothes on the floor and get in, overwhelmed by the sheer amount of options –quite literally hundreds- even for trivial things like the amount of light allowed inside the shower. At least I can stand under the shower head comfortably without my height getting in the way.

Hot water runs down my back as I'm washing blue foam out of my hair and freeing it of the knots that hold it in place and while it feels nice, I've decided I should be done so I turn off the shower and get the towel on the bar. As soon as I step out, though, a machine mounted on the wall starts drying and further detangling my hair, sending a strong current of warm air right at my face and within seconds my hair is completely dry. I simply put on the clothes I was wearing before.

As soon as I return to the main bedroom, there's a knock at the door. I open it to reveal Finnick, who's apparently come to tell me that the food's ready so I go with him.

Once we emerge from the hallway and back into the dining room he announces, "Here, I collected the last one and now all the children are present,"

"I'm older than you," I protest.

"Yeah, but I'm the victor here."

"Whatever, Fish Stick." I say, sitting down. I try to sit as far away from Gee as possible, and the entire time we exchange not a single word. We avoid eye contact. I notice that she's taken off the necklace she wears every day, one I gave her a while back that she's using as her token. It's just a cord with a little seashell and a small piece of driftwood with a hole drilled through it, but the fact that she's taken it off after an argument seems significant.

Mostly Julia talks, but occasionally one of the victors chimes in as well. Gee and I both stay completely silent. Eventually everyone finishes dinner and walks back to their rooms. I find a pair of pajamas and let my reaping clothes fall to the floor as I change, turning off the light and climbing into the bed, not caring that it's only eight.


End file.
